Imagine if you were a woman in nineteenth-century America, what do you think life would be like? The obvious answer is that one would be subjected to being a housewife and only a housewife, but there was something else that went far beneath this superficial oppression. For women, the 19th century was a dark time. Not only were they considered glorified handmaids, but they were also greatly oppressed and subjected to the domination of man. At that time, women could not vote and it was socially unacceptable for a woman to do much without the proper consent of her husband or father. In the story The Yellow Wallpaper, by Charlotte Perkins Gilman, the reader explores the idea of ​​how deeply this oppression affects the average woman. In the story, the protagonist is denied the simple right to her own sanity and peace of mind wherever she expresses the desire to be free. The nineteenth century was not a pleasant time for women, especially those who had the courage to ask to be treated like a man. The beginning of The Yellow Wallpaper offers an introduction to the two main characters, the narrator and her husband, John. The narrator takes the time to describe herself and her relationship with her husband from the beginning, giving the reader insight into their less-than-perfect marriage. John, a doctor, believes there is something wrong with his wife, but denies that her problems may be psychological. Instead, he diagnosed her with “temporary nervous depression” and prescribed bed rest in a room where she would be forced to remain for most of the story. The narrator objects to this decision, but there was not much she could do to convince her husband otherwise. He realizes this very fact, feeling hopeless with… the medium of paper…” (Gilman, 649). John's complete lack of concern for his wife's well-being is an entirely new form of oppression that even borders on abuse. She had depended on him for so long and then, in her moment of greatest need, he had abandoned her. The nineteenth century was not an optimal time. Although we may look at the past through a romantic ideal, in reality we only see it through rose-colored glass. For women, particularly the narrator of The Yellow Wallpaper, this was a time of hardship and oppression, simply because they were women. They lived under the rule of man and we taught them to obey. Women were never to move away, never to have a free thought. That's why if ever a woman felt it was okay to live her own life, she would be called absurd and told to simply continue serving. In the 19th century a woman was not a human being, they were servants.